In recent years, scientific studies have espoused the health benefits of a diet rich in omega-3 fatty acids such as eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA). These fatty acid have been shown to be essential for maintaining brain health and studies indicate they also promote cardiovascular health, reduce inflammation and prevent arthritis, improve gastric health, and have anti-depressive effects.
Omega-3 fatty acids occur naturally in various food sources including certain fish, crustaceans, nuts, and seeds. Additionally, concentrated forms of omega-3 fatty acids make up a large segment of the vitamin and supplement industry. Among the animal-derived sources of omega-3 fatty acids, fish oil has gained prominence as being a popular vitamin source. However, fish oil capsules have the drawback of leaving a “fishy” aftertaste.
Scientists are researching alternative sources of omega-3 fatty acids to determine if they may be more bioavailable. For example, some studies have preliminarily shown that krill oil derived from Antarctic hill may be a superior source of omega-3 fatty acids because it is more bioavailable than fish oil. See Ramprasath, et al. “Enhanced increase of omega-3 index in healthy individuals with response to 4-week n-3 fatty acid supplementation from hill oil versus fish oil”, Lipids in Health and Disease 2013, 12: 178 and Schuchardt, et al. “Incorporation of EPA and DHA into plasma phospholipids in response to different omega-3 fatty acid formulations—a comparative bioavailability study of fish oil vs. hill oil” Lipids in Health and Disease 2011, 10:145. Some speculate that these omega-3 fatty acids are attached to phospholipids which make them more bioavailable compared to omega-3 fatty acids derived from fish sources which are attached to triglycerides. See Schuchardt, et al. Additionally, hill is sustainable since it is the largest biomass in the world and only less than 1% of hill in the ocean is harvested each year; hill has been marketed as having no aftertaste and non-detectable levels of mercury; and hill contains the antioxidant astaxanthin.
While krill oil seems to be a superior source for omega-3 fatty acids, there remains a need for a better way to process hill in order to harvest the omega-3 fatty acids and produce a product that is bioavailable, low in water and other contaminants, and can be further processed downstream to produce high quality hill oil and other products utilizing the krill protein. More specifically, there is a need for a new method of producing a protein phospholipid complex wherein the digestive enzymes are inactivated by hydrolysis and proteins within the hill are not substantially denatured during the hydrolysis step, and a new method of producing a stable protein phospholipid emulsion where the emulsion does not separate and the water content is low enough to prevent microbiological growth.